Barton Sutter

With a nimble wit and a roving eye for detail, Sutter goes beneath the veneer of the North Country to expose its attractions, its quirks, and its characters. There isn’t a clinker in the collection.

These magnificent stories are big-hearted and loving in a way I don’t think I’ve ever encountered. With a calm and compassionate hand, Barton Sutter reveals to us the true dignity of humankind, the necessity of heroes and history, and the unerring aim of hope.

Starlight is light years away (thank God) from postmodern tactics; one might even say Sutter’s aesthetic is pre-modern. There are many poems with rhyme and meter, an unabashed celebration of nature, and most amazingly, a healthy sampling of what we see little of these days: the affirmative poem.

<>Bushed reveals how the souls of those in power affect the nation. The play is historical fiction based on actual quotations and recent events in U.S. history. Sonnets, ballads, villanelles, and songs imaginatively amplify the facts to expose the psychological conditions that gave them birth.